Today's blog post title comes from the song of the same name by "Argent". Whenever I'm feeling down, I find this song on my iPod and sing along with it loudly (this usually happens in my car, which invokes curious stares from other drivers).

Here's the Youtube Vid of it, in case you have never heard it before:

This song was playing on repeat in my car today.

So, why am I bringing any of this up? That's a great question. Allow me to explain . . .

As you know from my previous post, BlogFest 2011 / Spring Edition was Friday evening. For the last week or two, I've been working in my spare time (which these days, I have a lot of) to bring more traffic to NEPA Blogs by the way of Twitter and adding new blogs to the Blog Roll on that site. I've also been working the few contacts that I have in the local media to get coverage for the Blog Fest so that more people are interested in attending. Ever since participating in Leadership Wilkes-Barre last year, I have a strong desire to help plan events or make events "work". It's in my blood. Maybe I should change my career path and become an event planner or something to that extent. I've thought about it on more than one occasion. The problem is, when I plan an event, I need to have some control over it. I had little to no control over Blog Fest…which is completely fine, as it was not 100% my event. I did, however, expect a nod for trying to gather people together. I left feeling snubbed, which became more apparent the next day when my identity was mistaken for fellow NEPA Blogger Jennifer Wade who was not even in attendance that night.

In the past, these Blogger "get-togethers" were a great networking event. I got the opportunity to meet people I would not normally socialize with or have contact with in day-to-day life. This year had a different feel to it. To be brutally honest, I felt like a complete outcast. Don't get me wrong, I did have chats with several of the politicians and bloggers. I chatted with Gort and his wife, Yonki, Joe Valenti, Harold (obviously), Vito DeLuca (running for judge), Wil Toole (running for County Council), David Baloga, Joyce Gebhart, etc etc etc – I'm sure there are some that I missed. The air of a lot of the bloggers and politicians Friday night was one of "Oh, you aren't a political blogger. Then I really don't need to talk to you." Which, in my humble opinion, is the wrong message to send to potential future constituents. Everyone that night should have been greeted as equals. If you politicians think that only the political bloggers matter to get you elected then you have a VERY MYOPIC viewpoint.

I hate to say this guys, but the reason that most non-political bloggers do not come to these "get-togethers" is because they are intimidated by the political nature of the event. And here's an even bigger shock for you: NOT ALL BLOGS ARE ABOUT POLITICS. If we really want NEPA Blogs to be a fun and successful group to be a part of, why can't we have events that DO NOT INVOLVE POLITICS? I feel that these events tend to alienate those of us who blog about other topics. I've been invited to several of the NEPA Twitter meet-ups, but because of timing of the events and location, etc. I haven't been able to attend one. From what I've heard with those events, is that people from all walks of life (young and old alike) get together to have a great time out and there is no discussion of politics. Let's call BlogFest what it really was "Luzerne County Political Fest".

I rarely try to discuss politics on this blog. Opinions are like assholes and everyone's got one. Discussing beliefs on politics tend to get heated and hateful. But if you need to know, I am a Libertarian masquerading as a Democrat. I had to change my party to vote in the last presidential election, but never bothered to change it back.

At any rate, I'm pretty upset over this, and will probably not ever attend or plug another BlogFest going forward. It's sad to say that last night I was actually considered deleting this blog and moving on, but then I thought to myself, why should I change when everyone else sucks. I've had this domain name since 2001 and have been blogging since 2002ish. If you don't like my blog, don't read it, but DON'T TREAT ME LIKE A PIECE OF SHIT BECAUSE I DON'T BLOG ABOUT POLITICS.

It is January 6th, 2008 and I’m still unemployed (which is approximately 67 days longer than I thought I was going to be). I’ve applied for a few more jobs through Monster and Careerbuilder over the last few days, but I have not heard anything either way about any of the jobs. I suppose it is too soon to know if I’ve qualified for any interview with any of them, but more often than not I feel like my resume is sent into some sort of “resume black hole” and never gets looked at. I really wish employers would let you know one way or the other if you get a job/interview or if they find that you are not qualified. It would save my brain’s resources from continually stressing about it or thinking that I have a chance.

I’ve decided to pull Gabby out of daycare entirely. It will save me 67 dollars a week. I’m not poor, I can afford to take her to daycare. It is just a waste of time taking her there for 8am, then driving right back down there for 12 to pick her up 3 days a week. That four hours goes by so quickly, and it sucks fighting the Church traffic on the block her daycare is on and also fighting the downtown traffic twice a day. I’m lazy, and taking her to daycare requires me to get up early. I like to sleep in at least until 8am. Gabby and Owen are back on the waiting list, so hopefully if I do find another job they can get back in quickly.

Rich, the kids and I took a trip up to Hunlock’s Creek to look at this house for sale that *seemed* perfect for our needs. (and $135,000) One of my goals for 2008 is to sell my current house (or possibly rent it out) and move to a bigger house. There is nothing really wrong with this house, except that we’ve outgrown it. We are literally busting at the seems. The house was suitable for maybe 1-3 people at most. 4 people and a dog is a little unmanageable. Here is a picture of the house:

It looks pretty nice, right? Wrong. Looks ARE deceiving. We did a drive by the house earlier today to see if it was half way decent. Yeah, it wasn’t. The realtor website (linked above) said that the house was completely gutted and remodeled from the inside, new windows, new roof, etc. My question is who would put a new roof on their house knowing that it could cave in at any given second? Good question. To say this place looked like “The Money Pit” is the understatement of the year. I can’t imagine if we actually setup a walk thru with a real estate agent. I am pretty sure we would sink through the floorboards. Seeing that a house that shitty can cost $135,000; I think we can sell our dinky house for a cool mil. Any takers? Hey! At least my house internal plumbing (not so sure about the one above, however…) There is another house that we may like that costs a little more…but we’ll see. I don’t want to jinx myself by posting anything yet. Stupid crappy housing market.

It took me about 6 hours to file my unemployment claim online today. At first I thought my DSL was having issues. *Ahem* “HSI” was having issues. After checking all connections and transfers, it appeared to be just the PA Unemployment website I was having issues with. After trying for them umpteenth time, I decided to try and file the claim through their Phone System called “PAT” (haha, it made me think of the SNL character). That didn’t work either. Finally, through some miracle, I was able to get far enough into the website to file my 2 weeks of claims. I never got an email confirmation that stated the claim was processed successfully. I’m stuck in limbo now because I’m unsure if I will get paid this week. I’ll probably wind up calling there tomorrow and finding out if it did go through. What a pain in the ass. I checked with 2 other unemployed ex co-workers and they were having trouble also. Is it too much to ask to post an updated system message to let people know that there are issues going on? Here’s my suggestion.

I went shopping on Saturday at the Wyo Valley Mall to spend my gift cards. It turns out I had 200 dollars in JC Penney gift cards and a 30 dollar general mall gift card. I used the mall gc to buy Gabby and Owen each a new pair of shoes. Hopefully the new shoes will correct the issue of Owen continually kicking off of his shoes when we go out. I used the entire gift card, and had to put 11 dollars of my own money towards it. Not bad. 11 bucks for 2 pairs of name brand toddler shoes. I had every intention of spending the 200 dollars of JC Penney gift cards on myself, but after looking at all of the clothes and shoes that were there, I decided that I really didn’t need any new outfits right now. The shirts I seen all reminded me of something I already own. I ended up buying 4 bath towels all on sale for 7 bucks each, a set of 3 cast iron skillets (on sale also – for 11 bucks), and an 800 count sheet set (180 dollar…eeeek! I know a lot, but it was buy one get one free, so I got a second one for 180 dollars in a different color for free, can’t beat that). Since I put it all on my JC Penney Card, I got an extra 15% off, and put the gift cards towards my purchase. I only technically put 20 dollars towards the purchase. Not bad I say. Retail therapy always makes me feel better. I can’t wait to sleep in those new sheets.

Anyway, I’m getting pretty tired and those sheets are sounding better and better by the nanosecond. I think I rambled enough for one night. God, bed before 11…I’m wimping out. The kids didn’t get a nap today, so I’m worn out…leave me alone!

I got a bill from Owen’s ENT doctor on Thursday for 10 dollars. At first I was panicking because I thought maybe it was a co-insurance bill or something — when we were on our old insurance, we’d always get bills after the fact because of the co-insurance bullshit. They would always be ridiculous amounts of money. 2.80, 5.50, etc etc. Is it so urgent that I have to pay the amount right now, or can’t it just wait until the next time I’m in the office? I always loved the ones that were for a few cents. Way to waste a 41 cent stamp! It cost more to mail the damn bill than the amount they are collecting. But, if you didn’t pay that bill, the office would hound you about that couple dollar balance until it was paid off. I read through the entire bill only to see that it was my co-payment for the last office visit. I remember going to the appointment in OCTOBER, and they never asked me for payment, so I just left the office not thinking anything of it. Apparently, they are just remembering in December (2 months later) that they never collected their 10 dollar co-payment? Wtf? Who is in charge of that office. Shouldn’t someone have just asked me to pay before I left? We would have avoided this whole mess. Anyway, I called them and paid the balance over the phone with a credit card. That’s one less bill I have to mail.

Shortly after I called to pay that, I got a call from a place** I had a job interview with in September. It was the first week of September to be specific. They wanted to thank me for my patience throughout the whole process, but they picked another candidate. Another rejection. Terrific. Then I thought about it….I interviewed in September — its December. It took them 3 months to fill the job? Maybe I’m better off not getting that job if there is that much red tape there. So I’m back to square one again on the job front. I still have 2 jobs that I interviewed for that I’ve not heard back on. I’m not holding my breath in regards to those. I also just applied for another job on Monster that is almost exactly like what I used to do, and there are 2 more potentially that I’m going to try to apply for. Additionally, I have another lead through a previous co-worker, which I don’t really want to discuss in detail because of certain events that happened over the last two months. It has shown that certain people I know that I used to trust cannot be trusted anymore. I wish I could be more specific, but I don’t want to jeopardize anything on the job front. All I can say is….Karma. It will get you every time. Just ask Earl Hickey (from “My Name Is Earl” /obscure?).

Anyway, I’m a big fat failure who is unemployed and 10 dollars poorer now after Thursday. I just want to lock myself in a room and cry myself to sleep.